In the spring of 1999, when I was involved in Massachusetts
gun-rights politics, a number of us worked on developing pro-gun
public messages. We started with signs for a gun rights rally on
Boston Common, progressed to a billboard project, and discussed ideas
for lawn signs.

We debated about which one slogan was "best"; there were dozens of
excellent ones proposed, many in use elsewhere.

I suggested that we instead use a variety of signs, slogans, and
messages, but attach a single symbol to all of them as a "common
signature."

In a message I broadcast on the Internet in August of 1999, I
proposed that we adopt the five characters "RKBA!" as that common
signature of the gun rights community -- a unifying symbol like the
clenched fist of the black power movement or the pink triangle of the
gay liberation movement.

The four-letter acronym "RKBA" was already known to all of us; it
of course stands for the Right (of the people) to Keep and Bear Arms,
the phrase used in the Second Amendment of the Constitution of the
United States.

The new idea was to add the exclamation point, so that "RKBA!"
represents the entire main clause of the Second Amendment, with the
further effect of emphasizing the predicate portion: "The Right of
the people to Keep and Bear Arms SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED(!)."

You dont need fancy graphics to display this common
signature; its only four capital letters and an exclamation
point. Add it to pro-gun signs at rallies. Write it on invoices and
restaurant checks, on envelopes you mail and packages you send
anywhere people will see it. The gun rights movement is spreading
into the public consciousness, and this simple code serves both as a
public reminder and as a symbol of solidarity to rally us in the
freedom community.

Stickers:

The stickers were a separate idea. Richard Cashman related the
story of a manufacturer that handed out thousands of small
advertising stickers, Phil Clark suggested adding the image of the
Liberty Bell, and Len Cumbow donated Web space to display artwork for
comment. I designed the first versions of the RKBA!-Liberty Bell
stickers in late August of 1999, and since then have distributed
40,000 of them all over the country.

Theyre round, two inches in diameter -- just right for
applying to envelopes and elsewhere.

Now, where else can these stickers go? Where they'll be seen by
the most people. Everywhere. Here are a few ideas: This Halloween,
put a few (unpeeled -- that is, with the backing still on) in
trick-or-treat sacks along with the candy. Lots of parents will see
them, and some may even use them later. Stick up doctors' waiting
rooms (on magazines that you donate), store fronts (with the store's
permission, of course), as well as letters and packages of all kinds.
And remember, high school and college students may be our most
important "market."

[NOTICE: This communication is not a solicitation to break any
laws. I wont ship stickers to anyone who I know will use them
in an illegal manner.]

Now, over four years later, the second generation stickers, with
an improved design, are available. If you would like some, see
"How To Order Stickers."

The
Resistance:

Now... Some of us breathe more deeply with mention of the Sons of
Liberty, and most of us stand just a little taller with thoughts of
1776. But the anti-freedom forces have made a lot of progress in this
country -- so much so, in recent years, that times have changed;
we've entered a "new reality" (thank you, Andy Barniskis) -- and a
better model for us than the Concord Patriots may now be the French
Resistance during the Nazi occupation.

When someone asks who's writing RKBA! everywhere, and wants to
know who we are -- tell them we're The Resistance.

We're not the NRA (although most of us may be members); we're not
any other group. We're not conservative Republicans. We're not the
Christian religion, in any of its versions. We're not for or against
abortion, legalization or suppression of drugs, or any other issue
except individual liberty and the right of the people to keep and
bear arms.

And because -- like the French Maquis of the early 1940s -- we're
the voice of freedom in a country governed by tyranny, we're also the
Underground. Yes, that's already happened; the Clinton-Gore-Reno
mentality of government control still dominates much of American
society (and most of the rest of the world), and it wont go
away. Even now (2004), with a Bush-Cheney-Ashcroft administration,
how many of us want to advertise our gun ownership?

"When governments fear the people there is liberty. When the
people fear the government there is tyranny." ~~ Thomas Jefferson

Welcome to the Resistance.

On
Appeasement:

When I started the RKBA! idea 1999, there was some email
discussion of how "militant" the freedom movement should be. A
marvelous woman (a self-described "old lady," but a PhD professor of
social sciences) wrote the following to me:

"As you know, I like the Vive La Résistance theme...but
then I always preferred Winston Churchill to Neville Chamberlain.
More recently, it seems that black civil rights proceeded when the
reviled Black Panthers got going, and gay rights got off the ground
led by a bunch of kick-ass drag queens in The Stonewall Riots. The
women's movement even had S.C.U.M, and I won't offend sensibilities
by telling you what that stood for <g>. Tough Israelis like
Moshe Dayan and the Entebbe rescue made anti-Semitism and terrorism
less a popular sport. And then look at the horrendous success of
ACT-UP, the AIDS activist group (even though I wanted to shoot them
the night they disrupted the San Francisco Opera opening in
198?)."

"Point is, I am not too sure that "nice makes right" is a winning
philosophy. I have seen RKBA being whittled to nothing during the
sixties/seventies/eighties/nineties while the NRA et al continued
their best Neville Chamberlain impersonation. I suggest a poster
campaign...say Suzanna Gratia Hupp holding her favorite self defense
weapon with RKBA! and Vive La Résistance. I still like that
theme. And ain't I a woman? Anybody ask Claire Wolf what she thinks,
or Sarah Thompson?"

"It has always struck me that on any issue you really have one
(unpopular) minority doing battle with another (ruling caste)
minority, with the majority wafting towards whoever looks like the
winners, but basically wanting to sit it out. Your job as a minority
player is to rally and inspire your own troops, and neutralize the
mob in the middle so they stay out. You will never win many over
unless you look like a winner, or scare them half to death. Appeasers
do not look like winners. RKBA! Vive La Résistance!"

Women,
Too:

One further thing: I've always maintained that the highest
priority of the freedom movement is to reach out to women.

As a practical matter, women are over half the voters in this
country. As a moral matter, women need Samuel Colt's "equalizers"
more than anyone else. As an intellectual matter, it drives me nuts
that so many women buy into anti-self-defense propaganda that
essentially has them saying "rob me beat me rape me kill me, and then
do the same to my children, because I could NEVER touch one of those
horrible guns."

The collectivist, anti-freedom people have been shamelessly
deceptive, preying on women's protective instincts to steer them into
this kind of thinking. We HAVE TO reverse this process.

Disclosure: Im a member of the Board of Advisors of
KeepAndBearArms.com, THE Internet home of RKBA. I strongly prefer to
ship stickers only to paid-up members of KABA. For more information,
go to http://www.KeepAndBearArms.com
, and click on the Members Login/Join tab.

How To Order
Stickers

If you can send me a $10 donation to cover my costs, Ill
ship you a package of 128 stickers, by first-class mail, in an
ordinary Number 10 business envelope. (Thats the kind that
measures 9-1/2" wide by 4-1/8" high; it will hold 32 strips of four
stickers each.)

You supply the envelope, and address it to yourself. (If you want
to make a further contribution, you can put stamps on the envelope;
it will require first-class postage for three ounces, currently 83
cents.)

Mail to:

Along with the envelope and your $10 donation, please also enclose
a slip of paper with your name and email address. Ill email you
if I run out of stickers and have to order another print run (which
involves a two-week delay); otherwise Ill mail your package
within a few days.

(Note: If its later than June 2005, please email me first to
make sure Im still doing this.)

Thank you for your support of this campaign. Lets restore
liberty, one mind at a time. For the children.

-- Distinguished Life Member, Advisor, and New Hampshire
spokesman, KeepAndBearArms.com

=== Justifying the right to keep and bear arms by
statistics, on the basis of beneficial behavior by the many, is as
dangerous as denying that right on the basis of criminal behavior by
the few. You do not justify fundamental rights. RKBA! ===

=== There is no one more violent, more cowardly, nor more
obscene, than those who would use the armed might of the state to
deprive their fellow citizens, who have harmed no one, of their only
effective means of self defense. To forbid self-defense is to deny
the most basic of nature's rights, that of life itself. Gun control
kills. Resist! RKBA! ===

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